Everyone tells a little white lie from time to time, but when you have most of the country gunning for your demise you really shouldn’t tell whoppers.

Yesterday saw minister of home affairs turned minister of finance turned minister of home affairs Malusi Gigaba announce that Atul Gupta is not a South African resident.

Err, just the one problem Malusi – it’s not very hard to prove that you’re talking utter tripe. Times LIVE were all over this one:

Contained in thousands of #GuptaLeaks emails is a copy of Atul’s South African passport. The date of issue is July 31, 2015, and the document is valid for 10 years.

Under “Nationality”, the passport lists Atul as “South African”. Non-citizens cannot apply for passports.

Yup, there’s a picture of the dang thing:

Gigaba was briefing the media after a meeting with the portfolio committee on home affairs in Parliament, about the naturalisation of members of the Gupta family, and spent much of the day trying to avoid putting his foot in his mouth.

This from the Mail & Guardian:

Gigaba explained that five members of the family applied for naturalisation in March 2013. Of the five, some members had received their permanent residency in 2003 while others received theirs in 2008…

The department of home affairs rejected the family’s initial application in 2014 and indicated to them that they’d need to reapply in December 2017. The family then submitted a letter of appeal asking that they be granted naturalisation prior to 2017 as well as new documentation to support their appeal.

What followed was legally within his powers as the then minister of home affairs, but it’s not hard to fill in the gaps:

Gigaba, in terms of powers vested lawfully in him as home affairs minister, decided that exceptional circumstances…existed to justify ignoring the eligibility requirements.

In May 2015, he decided to override the initial decision taken by the director general to reject the Gupta family’s application for naturalisation.

In June of last year, via this tweet from Tumi Sole, this letter did the rounds:

Nice to have friends in high places, right?

As Gigaba’s statement was picked apart and found to be untrue, his spokesperson said in response that Gigaba had not vocalised his meaning properly.

You know who’s having a right old laugh, don’t you?

[sources:timeslive&mg]